{"id":364220,"date":"2026-04-05T01:13:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-05T01:13:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/364220\/"},"modified":"2026-04-05T01:13:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-05T01:13:08","slug":"bossing-the-boys-about-inside-life-as-new-zealands-only-fulltime-female-ref","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/364220\/","title":{"rendered":"Bossing the boys about: Inside life as New Zealand\u2019s only fulltime female ref"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cI could see behind the curtain with that performance background and I could just go \u2018wow, this is stunt work, this is theatre, this is sport, this is basically spectacle, music, lighting, costumes\u2019.<\/p>\n

\"AnnaAnna Wood, New Zealand’s only fulltime female wrestling referee, at an Impact Pro Wrestling (IPW) training session in Hobsonville. Photo \/ Corey Fleming<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s everything that goes into entertainment and performance arts just rolled up in this amazing package.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wood wanted to take on the character of a manager or announcer instead of a wrestler, in part due to a neck injury, but decided to be a referee because there was a shortage.<\/p>\n

\u201cI tried and I was terrible and I kept on being terrible for a while, it\u2019s the first time in my life that I\u2019ve been terrible at something and I haven\u2019t quit and walked away.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo that\u2019s probably why I\u2019m proudest of my refereeing more than anything else I\u2019ve done in my life and eventually I clicked and the time when I clicked was actually when I started to perform.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AnnaAnna Wood planned to be an pro wrestling announcer or a manager before becoming a referee. Photo \/ Corey Fleming <\/p>\n

Wood felt the promotion she works with, IPW, were great at welcoming her, but noted there aren\u2019t many women in the industry, and none in her role fulltime \u2013 apart from her now.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is a niche of a niche of a niche,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere have been other female referees for some matches, sometimes a wrestler will be a special guest referee or sometimes somebody will jump on a match or two for a show, but in terms of New Zealand female referees, I\u2019m pretty much it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wood said female referees are becoming more prominent internationally, particularly in the United States, but felt they face more scrutiny than their male counterparts.<\/p>\n

\"AnnaAnna Wood said crowds chant for her at events and she plays into it with her “Lady Reffington” persona. Photo \/ Corey Fleming<\/p>\n

\u201cThey can be doing exactly their job and exactly what the male referee would do, but because they\u2019re noticeable, it\u2019s \u2018I don\u2019t like her face\u2019, \u2018why is she there?\u2019, \u2018she\u2019s distracting me\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd if a woman being there is distracting you, then you\u2019ve got bigger problems, maybe it\u2019s not about the woman.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said she has faced issues at shows in New Zealand.<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes I get attention that perhaps is a little challenging, being one of the few women in wrestling at all and I think there\u2019s a little bit of some people who just think she\u2019s a woman but she knows about wrestling and their brain just breaks completely.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"DespiteDespite positive support, Anna Wood said she has still faced some issues at pro wrestling shows. Photo \/ Corey Fleming <\/p>\n

Wood hopes, alongside IPW\u2019s female wrestling division, to be someone young girls can look up to.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the things that I love about being a female referee is seeing little girls who\u2019ve been brought to the shows by their family and they\u2019ll look at me and they\u2019re like \u2018you\u2019re bossing the boys around and they have to do what you say\u2019. <\/p>\n

\u201cAnd I\u2019m like, \u2018yeah well you come and see me in 10 years and I will train you and you can boss the boys around and they\u2019ll do what you say\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo by seeing me in a role, maybe not wrestling but they can see a place for themselves within wrestling and once we get them to the gym, we\u2019ll get them in the ring.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ProPro wrestling referee Anna Wood, along with the IPW’s female division, hopes to be an inspiration for young girls. Photo \/ Corey Fleming<\/p>\n

She takes her role in the ring seriously and explained how referees are responsible for health and safety, but also keeping everything to time and ensuring the audience get what they pay for.<\/p>\n

\u201cPart of that I think is building rapport, that\u2019s why I train, that\u2019s why I\u2019m here every Tuesday is because I want to work with as many of the wrestlers as possible, get to know them, get to know what their moves are, learn their body language, but also they\u2019re learning me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wood said her progression is tied to the New Zealand wrestling scene\u2019s advancement, something she claimed to be growing as the IPW aimed to go bigger at its \u201cLive in Hamilton\u201d show, which saw 700 people attend last year. <\/p>\n

\"TheThe referee attends training sessions with IPW stars to better understand how they work in the ring. Photo \/ Corey Fleming <\/p>\n

\u201cIf I could get people to the live shows and … if we could outgrow our venues, that would be my goal for the next five years is to see us having to look elsewhere because we can\u2019t fit everybody into the halls we use.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cI could see behind the curtain with that performance background and I could just go \u2018wow, this is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":364221,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1443,806,144600,83890,191515,1848,67898,10474,24392,9787,55471,13313,6098,2944,296,29137,424,117,111,43,139,69,2847,6848,193,119745,29952,10814,23742,223,2846,8238,1354,8242,2963],"class_list":{"0":"post-364220","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-zealand","8":"tag-about","9":"tag-as","10":"tag-barking","11":"tag-beside","12":"tag-bossing","13":"tag-boys","14":"tag-canvas","15":"tag-control","16":"tag-each","17":"tag-female","18":"tag-fulltime","19":"tag-giant","20":"tag-hard","21":"tag-inside","22":"tag-into","23":"tag-keeping","24":"tag-life","25":"tag-new","26":"tag-new-zealand","27":"tag-news","28":"tag-newzealand","29":"tag-nz","30":"tag-only","31":"tag-orders","32":"tag-other","33":"tag-ref","34":"tag-ring","35":"tag-slam","36":"tag-stands","37":"tag-the","38":"tag-them","39":"tag-under","40":"tag-woman","41":"tag-wrestling","42":"tag-zealands"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364220","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=364220"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364220\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/364221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=364220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=364220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=364220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}